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Friday, May 16, 2014

Magic’s Heart by Thomas Oliver

If you write about a quest to deliver a magical object to a far-flung destination and thereby save the world from evil, you had better be up to the challenge, for your brave travelers unwittingly toil in the shadows
of Frodo and Sam. Thomas Oliver makes a credible foray into this formidable
subgenre with Magic’s Heart. This novel’s would-be heroes are a close-knit family whose members each possess a
distinct magical talent. Seventeen-year-old Aliya has an affinity for bodies of
water and the creatures that inhabit them. Her twin brother Crick has highly
developed outdoor skills honed through years of exploring. Their brother Yori, 11, has the most advanced
abilities of anyone in the family – he can detect magic and read the thoughts
and feelings of others. The remaining family members, including parents Orlando
and Siu and grandmother Abetta, each have their own magical specialties.

Yet they live in a region in which magic has come to be
suspect. The Darkness is gathering strength, and the leaders in the nearby city
of Immelus rely on military might to protect the people of the region. Url, an
elderly friend of the family who has dedicated his life to studying the origin
of magic, believes that the only way to combat the Darkness is to find the
Heart of Magic. After an arduous search of a subterranean cave, Url and the
family members find the Heart, which turns out to be a gemstone approximately
five feet in diameter. The group formulates a plan to deliver it to a legendary
stronghold of magic, the city of Iala. There it would be incorporated into a
magical torch on the Tower of Elliad. This torch, in theory, would be a weapon
sufficient to defeat the Darkness. As Url explains,

“When the Heart brought Magic into our world, it also,
unintentionally I believe – brought something else. Something far worse.A darkness from beyond our world and our understanding, attracted through the stars to the Magic of the Heart like a
terrible moth to the light of a distant flame… it brought the horror around
which the Black Wind exists. The true Darkness itself; ever hidden, ever
unknown, ever terrible… Sometime after the first Magic was found, the first
breaths of the Wind appeared. They started small and isolated, hovering around
the borders of our world like wolves around a flock, picking off the weak and
unwary. But over the years these breaths grew and came together in one vast
storm, engulfing horizons and destroying towns and cities and their peoples
within as quick as sound. And all the time it looked inwards, in towards the
light. In towards the Heart, seeking it, craving it… The Heart is the key – the
only key, beneath us this whole time – to ending the Black Wind! It is the one
and only thing which can bring to us the peace our world has lived without for
so long! The Heart is our freedom!”

But the group must brave hundreds of miles of wilderness,
the Black Wind, and an assortment of other threats to reach their destination.
They are joined on their quest by Tarryn, a young guardsman from Immelus, and
Aulan, a mysterious, otherworldly outcast.

A quest can be a tedious thing, fraught with empty miles,
bad weather, hunger, exhaustion, and often a growing tendency among the
travelers (and sometimes the readers) to ask, “Are we there yet?” Magic’s Heart tames the inherent tedium of a long journey by revealing a fully realized world with its own geography, politics, and bestiary. The travelers encounter friends and foes along the way.
They enter and quickly retreat from the dead city of Irraigon, devasted by the Black
Wind years ago. They sojourn for a time in the Undervalleys, where an entire
society dwells underground to avoid the perils of the encroaching Darkness.
They meet up with waterfaeries, scarravers (ants the size of wolves, with
deadly pincers), and stalkers, which are alchemically altered humans whose
wailing paralyzes its hearers with terror.

Throughout their journey, the group struggles to understand the
Heart’s capabilities and the role of magic in their world. Magic is not without
its pitfalls. A recurring theme is corruption resulting from the lure of
magic’s power. Tarryn describes to the others how the leaders of Immelus hoard
information about magic: “Any knowledge that’s ever been passed down to the
main of the City and the rest of the Heartlands has been sieved and corrupted a
hundred times over by the Council… Anything which may benefit them in some way,
either then or sometime in the future, they hold back for themselves. There’s
so many centuries of history and secrets hidden within the City, they’ve
probably forgotten half of it themselves…”

This novel is intended to be the first in a series called The Núminway Chronicles. There is much
to admire in this ambitious opening installment. The author has clearly lived
and breathed the world he describes for a very long time, imagining it down to
the smallest detail. There are grand concepts and epic struggles, and it’s
apparent that much more remains to be revealed about this world in the coming
volumes.

The execution, however, is not flawless. Parts of the novel
dragged. The chapters describing the search for and retrieval of the Heart of
Magic from the cavern are a prime example of this. Another quibble I have is
with the character of Yori. He is characterized as possessing the greatest
magical talent of anyone in the family, yet he spends significant stretches of
time withdrawn and afraid, brooding silently on the growing danger instead of
making himself useful. To put it bluntly, I found him annoying. Finally, some
of the prose was a bit challenging because of word choice, punctuation, and
sentence construction. I think a good editor could make a profound difference.

When the travelers finally reach Iala, the novel really takes
off. These final chapters are the strongest in the book. They introduce the
most memorable secondary characters, culminate in a satisfyingly cataclysmic
conclusion, and effectively set the stage for the sequel.

Full Disclosure

Unless otherwise noted, books submitted for review have been provided free of charge to the New Podler book review blog. The majority of these are ebook versions of print editions. The Podler Staff do not receive any compensation for reviews.

INDEPENDENT NOVEL AWARD

The Independent Novel Award (INA) recognizes the best indie-published books that have been reviewed on this blog.

In 2016, the winners were Madam Tulip by David Ahern, The Colony by RM Gilmour, and The Silver Mask by Christian Ellingsen.

In 2015, the winner was Tethered Worlds: Blue Star Setting by Gregory Faccone.

In 2014, the winners were Chained by Fear by Jim Melvin and Noise by Brett Garcia Rose.

In 2013, the winners were Realmgolds by Mike Reeves-McMillan, Black Book: Volume 1 by Dylan Jones and A Calculated Life by Anne Charnock.

In 2012, the winners were Lunch Bucket Paradise by Fred Setterberg, This Jealous Earth by Scott Dominic Carpenter, Oathbreaker Book Two: The Magus's Tale by Colin McComb, We Live Inside You by Jeremy Robert Johnson and M. Terry Green's Shaman, Friend, Enemy.

In 2011, the winners were Flaming Dove by Daniel Arenson, Being Light by Helen Smith, Gunshot Stigmata by Scott C. Rogers, Oathbreaker Book One: The Knight's Tale by Colin McComb and Mirror Shards, an anthology edited by Thomas K. Carpenter.

In 2010, the winners were Skygirl and the Superheroic Legacy by Joe Sergi, Arguing With Henry by Niall Hunter, ZombieStop Parade by Richard Buzzell and The Losing Role by Steve Anderson.

In 2009, Shooting an Albatross by Steven R. Lundin won the Independent Novel Award.

In 2008 no award was given.

In 2007, Chion by Darryl Sloan won the International Print on Demand Book Award, the precursor of the INA.

Submission Status:

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